Chapter 23

Vehemently, I shook my head from side to side. “I don’t want to change schools.”

Mom zoomed right along, fixing a bright smile on her face. “Or we can move. Your dad and I have always talked about going back to the city some day. Picture it, Sunday afternoons at the art museum, picnics at the park.”

I said it louder. “I don’t want to change schools!”

Dad patted my leg. There were tears in his eyes. “We want you to be happy. That’s all we want.”

“And all I want is to stay at Montessori,” I said. With Leonids.

Nadia and I are lying on the couch watching TV, and my mom’s on her computer working on her Thanksgiving spreadsheet. It’ll be a small Thanksgiving this year. My dad’s brother’s family is coming from New York City, and our California grandma was supposed to come, but she decided at the last minute she didn’t want to make the trip, which upset my mom. Next year, she keeps saying, we’ll go to California instead.

A couple of times we’ve had Rennie and her mom over for Thanksgiving. L